While you wait for service, make yourself at home

Large, elaborate and packed with people -- that's what dealerships' service department waiting rooms are becoming, said Forrest McConnell, chairman of the National Automobile Dealers Association, last week.

"More people are waiting," he said, because dealers are doing more express services, such as oil changes and tire rotations. For quick jobs, customers tend to wait.

"So everybody's making their waiting rooms bigger," McConnell said. "We always think of the facilities and think about it from the sales end, right? But a lot of that is you come in and wait."

Some brands already are making that change, modeling their waiting rooms on upscale coffee bars. But that just means, McConnell said, "People's expectations of the waiting room have increased by a tremendous amount."